Looking for a free, modern, and powerful alternative to Microsoft Office? This little-known office suite will give you everything you need for work or school.
With the start of the school year and the return to the office, the need for a complete and efficient office suite is once again felt. In this area, Microsoft’s well-known applications reign supreme: Word, Excel and PowerPoint are indeed ubiquitous and essential tools, whether in business or at school.
But these famous software are not free and are even sold at a high price by the Redmond firm, whether as a subscription or a one-time purchase. Of course, it is possible to use some of these applications online for free, but in limited versions that require being permanently connected to the Internet, which is not always possible.
Among the free alternatives to Microsoft software, the best known is undoubtedly LibreOffice. But despite its undeniable qualities, this office suite suffers from several flaws that put off users. Its aging graphical interface and its compatibility problems with Microsoft Office files are two major obstacles to its use.
Fortunately, other free office applications exist, and one of them has been gaining momentum in recent years, although it remains relatively unknown to the general public: OnlyOffice. This open source office suite, developed by the company Ascensio System, has several significant advantages to position itself as a serious alternative to Microsoft Office.
First of all, OnlyOffice offers a modern and elegant graphical interface, with a grouping of tools in tabs at the top of the application, and the choice between several light or dark display themes. The ergonomics of the different software is therefore very familiar, and it is easy to find your marks when you are used to Microsoft applications.
Then, OnlyOffice offers very good compatibility with files created on Word, Excel or PowerPoint, since the application uses by default the DOCX, XLSX and PPTX file formats. Thus, display problems and layout losses, when opening Microsoft Office files, are much rarer than with other office suites.
Finally, OnlyOffice natively integrates real-time collaboration and co-editing functions. The application allows several people to work on the same document at the same time, to post comments, to track changes using a history and to give differentiated access rights to each user.
The suite consists of four modules, a text editor, a spreadsheet, a slideshow tool and a PDF form editor, which cover the office needs of the majority of users. It is also available for free on all devices (computers, smartphones and tablets) and all systems (Windows, macOS, Linux, Android and iOS).
Even though OnlyOffice does not yet offer all the most powerful functions of the Microsoft suite, this application is well worth taking a look at. Whether you are a middle school student, high school student, student or already employed, you will find a complete set of tools and modern functions, which will undoubtedly meet most of your needs, even professional ones.